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The Master Fish Butcher of Tokyo’s Union Square

By Glenn Collins March 20, 2013 11:00 amMarch 20, 2013 11:00 am

Back of House, an occasional column, celebrates the unsung characters who animate the restaurant universe.

TOKYO — Kondo-san. That’s who he is to all at the Union Square restaurant here: the master fish butcher who, nearly six years ago, helped to open the first and only satellite of Danny Meyer’s original Union Square Cafe in Manhattan.

Photo

Yoshikazu KondoCredit Keisuke Kai

His full name is Yoshikazu Kondo, and he breaks down deliveries of red snapper, flounder, sea bass, bream and rockfish with four other cooks.

Though the Japanese menu at this Union Square is similar to that of the American version, there are more fish options in the sleek 100-seat restaurant that inhabits an alternate universe from the mother ship, in just the sort of gleaming upscale mall where food-crazed Japanese quest for yearned-for cuisine.

On a recent afternoon, Kondo-san wielded a thin, long yanagi, or willow, knife with exquisitely forceful strokes to carve enough perfectly portioned slices of carpaccio to serve 60 diners from a 17-pound, brilliant red rockfish.

Sustainable Idiom

“My mentor was Wataru Ogawa, a great chef in Chiba, and his training was in the French idiom. He was very meticulous. And I became meticulous, too. You know, in our restaurant, all of our fish is sustainable. I have no interest in any other. You have to be meticulous if you are taking a creature’s life. With fish, you must always take great care.”
Red-Gill Review

“We get only the freshest of the fresh — fish directly from a Chiba harbor, bypassing Tsukiji (the legendary market in Tokyo). They are carefully inspected: for quality, for radiation, for many things. Of course, everyone knows that the gills of the freshest are bright red, not pink. But I just sniff. I can tell.”

The Edible Aesthetic

“Although 70 percent of our customers are Japanese, not a few of them have eaten at Union Square in Manhattan. Our standards must be very high. The aesthetic of our presentation is extremely important. We must appeal to the tongue. But also to the eye.”

Poison-Fin Focus

“If you are not focused and concentrated, you suffer many cuts, of course — it is part of the job. But if you are stabbed by the sharp fin of any fish, your hand can get infected. And even the fins of nonpoisonous fish like sea bass can be poisonous! Always, you must focus.”

Long-Nosed Cornet

“Most difficult fish to fillet? The yagara — the cornetfish, it is red, with a long nose. It’s 2 meters — and that is much too long for my cutting board!”

This interview has been condensed and edited, and was translated by Mari Takeuchi.